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The Truth About Marriage

Too many people thought I was out of my mind when I decided to get married at 21 years old. My mom sat me down and explained to me that I was too young to get married and my fianceé wasn’t ready to be committed yet. My husband is two years younger than me. Frankly, I was terrified but today, nearly 3 years in, I don’t regret my decision to get married young. Now, it’s not to say that marriage is a walk in the park, I want to share with you, my first year of marriage and hope to give you insight into what to expect when you finally move in together and only have each other to depend on as husband and wife.

Before my wedding, people would always comment to me and let me know that the first year of marriage is the easiest because you’re in the honeymoon stage. I always kept this opinion in mind and was always aware that eventually the sparks may die down and we’ll be left with a plain and boring marriage but 3 years later I’ve found that we need each other more than we ever did while we were dating. I Also found that our honeymoon stage never ended.

I did realize that my husband and I were on different pages. He was 19 and I was 21. I’m older than my husband, yes, but it’s the way it happened. Anywho, He was into breakdancing and had never lived on his own while I had lived on my own for 3 years through college and had a career ahead of myself. As soon as I started working. Our first apartment was the first time my husband experienced complete responsibility for his own life. Besides the responsibilities, there were other things that struck us hard when we got married. They were sex, finances, communication, and family and friends. I’ll talk about each one at a time.

Our first apartment was the first responsibility my husband had on his own. Besides the apartment, there were other things that struck us hard when we got married. They were sex, finances, communication, and family and friends. I’ll talk about each one at a time.

Sex

Sex was so bad for us! My husband is affected easily by fatigue and on our wedding night he danced so much he was struggling to put out and I was prepared to have sex on our wedding night. Sex that night was such a struggle that it was probably one of the worst nights we ever had! We both were so clueless for the first year of marriage that now whatever we do in bed has become a result of years of trial and error we suffered through before we got to where we are now where we both are satisfied after sex. It takes time.

I realized how complicated sex actually is especially for women. My husband had no clue how hard it is to have sex until one day we stopped forcing ourselves to have sex and now we have sex when we both have to have sex. I had the biggest fear of having a sexless marriage that I would plan sex. I learned that not only is it more exciting for us to have sex spontaneously but it’s more relaxing because it doesn’t matter what we do, we just want to get it done and feel satisfied. To paint the picture more clearly, we rarely plan for sex. We never do. We may say we want to after work or on a specific day but most likely it won’t happen. It’s so much pressure to come up with stuff and we enjoy each other more when we both want to have sex at the same time. If you must know we have sex about 1-3 times a week, depending on work and I’m satisfied!

Finances

Finances happened to be the hardest thing we had to learn to do well. I love to spend money and so does my husband. It’s the thing we struggled the most with and have fought over most. If there’s one thing that you’ll always argue about in marriage it’ll be sex and money. You won’t have sex because you’re both stressed about money or you’ll have a lot of sex because you are tight on money and have nothing better to do. It makes no sense but they work hand in hand.

I hate when we’re tight on money. I like my coffee, new clothes, and I love to get dolled up. So when we have to save extra money those are the first perks that have to go and I’m usually good about it but it was my biggest struggle not being able to use my money for myself like I was used to. Now it became our money. To this day, three years later, I hate sharing my money. I know, it’s dumb but all I’m asking is for a personal account where I can use my money however I want!

Anyway, we got ourselves into serious debt moving back and forth to New York City and now we have begun to pay everything back because we’re thinking about starting a family soon. We kept delaying being serious about money but now we seriously have to. The key thing we learned about finances is that we both value money differently but we both had the same goal which helped us both get serious with our money. Luckily we learned earlier better than later. It just took 3 years.

Family & Friends

This was another issue we dealt with. My family was always difficult to get along with and I’ve had falling outs with multiple family members but my husband’s family was the complete opposite. Even though they’ve had their share of problems they were also forgiving and able to move on from the past for the most part.

Our biggest issue comes when the holidays hit. I absolutely hate the holidays because we would have to drive 30 minutes to see my father and turn back around to see my mother and then spend the rest of the day with my husband’s family. This year that passed I didn’t see my mom on Thanksgiving or my father and I only visited my mom on Christmas but not my father. I was just fed up with it.

Today, now that we’re both in New York, when I see my family there’s less fighting and we spend a more enjoyable time together. I still have to see my father.

Communication

Everyone says that communication is important. In marriage, it’s better to shut up I learned. If you don’t have anything worth saying, keep silent. Numerous times I want to say things to my husband about other men bothering me or yell out of anger but I stop myself. I had to learn how to do that. He doesn’t need to worry about everything and if I’m not calm when I speak there’s no reason to chat until I am relaxed. Once you say something you can’t take it back and you’ll always remember what your husband said.

I love when my husband is stressed and going crazy about life and I get to be the person to calm him down and let him let out his thoughts and what he’s holding to me. It’s a great privilege to take that stress away from him. Just last week I learned that what he was stressing about was more stressful because he thought he was stressing about it alone. I let him know right away that I was thinking about the same things too and to not feel alone.

Today, we have almost 3 years of experience in marriage. I wish I could put that on my resume! I know that a 3-year marriage is nothing compared to other marriages out there but I want to say that for those of you hoping for a fairytale marriage, or a marriage where you’re the princess and your prince takes care of you, which is what I thought, isn’t going to happen! I was absolutely crazy to have believed that.

My husband and I depend on each other for everything. We talk all the time, through texting or social media and we think about each other constantly. I know my husband is thinking about me when he shares corgi videos to me on Facebook and he knows I’m thinking about him when I text and ask him how his day was.

We’re both different and communicate uniquely. We both come from varied backgrounds and met at perfect timing.

If I would have delayed my marriage to my man I would’ve never said yes. I’m so glad I asked God the night before my wedding, and several times before, to give me a clear answer. I asked God, “Was this the man I was going to spend the rest of my life with?” God was quick to answer, yes.

I’m glad that now I can spend the rest of my life creating memories with the love of my life. I’m overjoyed that my young years are spent with my best friend, my husband.

Yessenia Diaz has a background in graphic and web design but is also intrigued by writing and teaching. Yessenia created Tru.Works as an outlet for all her talents and continues collecting stories from around the world to share with people all across the interweb. Follow Yessenia on Instagram and her favorite, Twitter, @ythegreatdiaz.